If you answered yes to each of these questions, an upcoming treatment group at UWA may be of interest to you.
We are running therapy groups for children with anxiety.
The treatment will closely follow the ‘Cool Kids’ program, an effective group therapy for decreasing anxiety. It runs for 10 weeks, for 1.5 hours each week on a Saturday morning, with sessions for both parent(s) and child held at the same time.

The group sessions will be at the Robin Winkler Clinic (Myers St Crawley) at the University of WA. Your child can continue with any existing therapy or medication throughout that he/she is already involved in throughout the group program.

If you are interested, please contact
Emily South at emily.south@research.uwa.edu.au or
6488 2644 for more information.

In an age when computer technologies, artificial intelligence, robotics and digital technologies are increasingly determining how we think and live, fundamental questions are being asked about what it is to be human. As interactions between humans and computers become more complex, the boundary between computers and humans is shifting. Consider, for example, implanted bio-sensing devices. If computers are embedded within us, are they then part of our human identity?

Some people welcome their robotic companions, driverless cars and delivery drones. Others are disturbed by the growth autonomous technologies and the complex roles and responsibilities being relinquished to them. How concerned should we be as the characteristics and values that make us human are increasingly manifest in new technologies?

Join us for the 2017 Manning Clark House Day of Ideas as we ask what a robotic future could look like and what it might mean for human beings.

Speakers:

Anu Bharadwaj, PhD candidate, Centre for Transformative Work Design, UWA Business School;
Dr Anjali Jaiprakash, Advance Queensland Research Fellow, Medical and Healthcare Robotics, Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Robotic Vision, Queensland University of Technology;
Dr Eleanor Sandry, Department of Internet Studies, Curtin University;
Anna Sawyer, Road Safety Manager, RAC, PhD candidate, Philosophy, School of Humanities, The University of Western Australia;
Dr Chris Stanton, The Marcs Institute for Brain, Behaviour & Development, Western Sydney University;
Dr Elizabeth Stephens, Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Queensland;
Sean Welsh, PhD candidate, Department of Philosophy, University of Canterbury, New Zealand

Cost: $30

14:00 - SYMPOSIUM - The Clever Country: The importance of investing in regional and remote students

This symposium brings together a panel of experts from across Australia to discuss ways to support regional and remote students to succeed in higher education. The purpose is to explore the value of investing in higher education from the perspective of the individual, community and the university sector and to question what we need to do to become a truly ‘clever country'.

The symposium will feature the following panel of experts:

Professor Grady Venville Chair (Dean of Coursework Studies, The University of Western Australia)

The symposium will be held in The University Club of Western Australia Auditorium, and refreshments will be provided.
Attendance is free, but tickets are limited so RSVP is essential. Reserve your ticket here: http://bit.ly/2xunNxe

Wednesday 18

18:00 - PUBLIC TALK - Dating Homo naledi: the story of the surprisingly young age for a new species of hominin that lived in Africa alongside early Homo sapiens

A public lecture by Dr Hannah Hilbert-Wolf, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, James Cook University.

Earlier this year an international team of scientists successfully dated the remains of Homo naledi, a new species of hominin (human ancestor), from the Rising Star Cave in South Africa. In 2013 the first ~1,550 bones belonging to Homo naledi were discovered ~30m below the Earth’s surface, in the dark and difficult-to-reach Dinaledi Chamber of the Rising Star Cave in The Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site. This new species was exciting and perplexing, as the skeletons displayed morphologies similar to both ancient hominins, such as the shape of the pelvis and a small skull, and to recent hominins, such as modern-looking feet. To understand how Homo naledi fits into the story of human evolution, the fossils needed to be robustly dated; a task that proved to be very difficult.

Dr Hannah Hilbert-Wolf, a geologist who has herself studied the sedimentology in the depths of the Rising Star Cave, discovered hominin remains, and helped to date the fossils, will present the compelling story of the discovery of Homo naledi and explain the comprehensive dating approach taken by the team. Surprising results place the age of these fossils between 335,000 and 236,000 years old, which is far younger than what many experts anticipated. Additionally, the team recently announced the discovery of a second chamber (the Lesedi Chamber) deep in the Rising Star Cave, containing an additional 133 Homo naledi fossils. Dr Hilbert-Wolf will discuss how our newfound knowledge about Homo naledi allows us to question long-held assumptions about human evolution. Dr Hannah Hilbert-Wolf is a sedimentary geologist, with additional expertise in geochronology, tectonics, paleoseismicity, and paleontology.

Video has become a well-established tool within learning and teaching, supported by a growing body of evidence demonstrating its positive impact on both the achievement of learning outcomes and the student experience. More recently the potential of video has started to shift away from teaching ‘with’ video to teaching ‘through’ video; the notion that video isn’t simply a digital method of delivering content but can also play an active role in the learning process itself.

In this 45 minute presentation we will be exploring how the use of student-created video is being used to support authentic, engaging, creative, active and problem-based learning, both globally and in our very own backyard at UWA. Join us and learn more about student-created video, its relevance to you and the facilities available on campus to help you make it part of your teaching.

Chinese political leaders and intellectuals continue to struggle with how ‘Chinese values’ fit with ‘universal values’ and by extension, global institutions.

Is there a single global modernity that perhaps China can shape? Or are there multiple modernities and multiple, perhaps competitive, values that political systems aspire to?

In the past, debates have focused on the question of whether Confucianism is in conflict or compatible with democracy. However, these debates are increasingly becoming more complex in response to new political and social forces and new questions concerning the relationship between democracy and Confucianism.

Join in the conversation and see how Confucianism and democracy are shaping our understanding of China today.

A public lecture by Professor Jeffrey Bamber, Head, Ultrasound and Optical Imaging Physics, The Institute of Cancer Research London and Institute of Advanced Studies Gledden Short Stay Visiting Fellow.

Compared with other medical imaging technologies, ultrasound is low cost, transportable, rapid, safe and comfortable for the patient. It offers excellent 3D soft tissue visibility, good blood flow information and high frame rate. It has already made enormous contributions to medicine but the potential for further impact is truly exciting.

This lecture will draw on the author’s work in cancer research to look at recent progress, mentioning parallels that exist because of lessons learnt from mining and construction industries.

A very promising area is mechanical property imaging, known as elastography. A key aim of Professor Bamber’s visit to Perth is to collaborate with The University of Western Australia on this topic. As in geophysics, different types of mechanical wave travel in tissue at different speeds, each providing importantly different information. In medicine, we use a pressure wave (ultrasound) to watch the progress of a shear wave and make images of its speed. This is proving important for diagnosis and assisting treatment of an astonishingly wide range of diseases.

This workshop will explore how micro-learning can change the way you educate your students. Micro-learning is an innovated method of teaching through ‘bite-size chunks’ of accessible content that actively engages students by encouraging them to use their mobile devices in support of their learning, rather than as a distraction.

After discussing current research on micro-learning in higher education, we will showcase some practical ways to integrate micro-learning techniques into your teaching by incorporating the use of social media. You will also learn how to create appropriate ‘bite-size’ digital content for effectively engaging students on social media platforms, and then try your hand at crafting your own live micro-lecture on Twitter!

Note: Bring your own mobile device (smart phone, ipad etc) along to this workshop or borrow one of ours.

A public lecture by Alex Holcombe, Co-director of the Centre for Time, University of Sydney and Institute of Advanced Studies Visiting Fellow.

Time cannot be seen or touched, yet we do experience it. Do our brains contain an internal clock whose ticks mark the passing of seconds, minutes, and weeks? Why does time sometimes seem to crawl, and other times fly? Results from experimental psychology and neuroscience will be used to address these questions. We will then zoom in on the shortest timescale, of moment-by-moment experience. Every millisecond, different aspects of the world such as colour and motion, are being processed by distinct parts of the brain, but our experience of these aspects is unified and assigned to a single timeline. Or is it? Some animated displays will be presented, the experience of which undermine our assumptions of how consciousness evolves over time.

Wednesday 25

17:30 - STUDENT EVENT - The Big Idea UWA Final | Live Pitch Event : UWA final of the national social enterprise competition The Big Idea

The Big Idea is a social enterprise competition where university students around Australia work on their big idea for improving the lives of people experiencing disadvantage.

Students participating in The Big Idea develop a concept and business plan for a social enterprise or social business with a mission to change the lives of disadvantaged Australians. It is a national competition delivered by The Big Issue and this year, UWA is one of the 13 university partners.

At this event, five teams of undergraduate UWA students will pitch to an expert judging panel. The winner of this event will go through to compete at the national finals.

Everyone is invited to come along to support the teams, their commitment to addressing disadvantage in Australia, and their big ideas! As an attendee, you'll also get to vote on the Audience Choice Winner!

If a UWA team reaches the national grand final, they will travel to Melbourne to compete. Last year, the winning team from UWA successfully competed in the national semi-finals to make the grand final, where they delivered their pitch to a live judging panel of university and industry experts. They attended an awards evening hosted by The Big Issue and also participated in a professional immersion day at PwC in Melbourne.

Venue: Murdoch Lecture Theatre, UWA
Arrive at 5.15pm for a 5.30pm start and there will be a short interval during the event.

A public lecture by Deirdre O’Connor, School of Agriculture and Food Science, University College Dublin and UWA Institute of Advanced Studies Visiting Fellow.

Social Farming offers people who avail of a range of social/health services (including mental health, physical/intellectual disability, elder care, among others), or who experience social marginalisation, the opportunity to engage in the farming and related social activities of their communities.This opportunity is offered through the medium of ordinary farms and families acting in partnership with service providers and the people who avail of these supports. It provides such groups of people with an opportunity for inclusion, increased self-esteem and improved health and well-being. Social farming also creates an opportunity to further connect farmers with their local communities through opening up their farms as part of the social support system of their locality.

While the practice of using horticultural or agriculture-related therapies to support vulnerable people in Ireland has a long history, traditionally, these services were offered within an institutional setting. The idea of linking a family farm with social, health or care services, in order to provide service users with a social farming experience, is a relatively new concept in Ireland. At the same time, there is growing recognition of, and interest in, this family-farm based model in Ireland, informed and inspired by successful practices, policies and institutional supports which are emerging across Europe and further afield.

This lecture will explore recent developments in social farming in Ireland in a comparative context and consider how the lessons learned and insights gained might usefully transfer to other settings.

Once again St George’s College will be holding the free community event Spring Fair on October 29th from 11am-4pm. The fair promises to be a lively day with packed activities and something for everyone to enjoy. Wine tastings, musical entertainment, kids' activities, market stalls. The Fair will be held on the College grounds.

Tuesday 31

18:00 - PUBLIC LECTURE - Luther’s Reformation at 500: Myth, Memory, and the Making of History : This is an Institute of Advanced Studies and Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies series of lectures.

It’s not at all certain that Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to a church door in Wittenberg in October of 1517. Nevertheless, this moment continues to be commemorated as marking the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, an enormously complex series of religious, political, social, and cultural transformations that fractured the Christian church and divided Europe. This lecture will consider 1) the significance of Luther’s Theses in the larger historical and theological context of the period, 2) how Luther was imagined and remembered by his contemporaries, and 3) how the shadow of Luther continues to obscure our historical understanding of the sixteenth-century religious reformations five hundred years later.

Kirk Essary is a postdoctoral research fellow for the ARC Centre for the History of Emotions at UWA. He is an intellectual and religious historian of the sixteenth century, and his first book is Erasmus and Calvin on the Foolishness of God: Reason and Emotion in the Christian Philosophy (University of Toronto Press, 2017).

About this Series

On the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation, this UWA Institute of Advanced Studies – Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies Lecture Series reconsiders the legacy of Martin Luther, who in 1517 published Ninety-Five Theses criticising the Church’s sale of indulgences. From diverse historical perspectives, UWA researchers tackle key issues regarding Luther’s life, his thought, and his significance for the momentous changes that Europe underwent during his lifetime.

http://www.mems.arts.uwa.edu.au/

November 2017

Wednesday 01

18:00 - PUBLIC TALK - Dissidence and Discrimination: LGBTIQA+ research and experience

The UWA LGBTIQA+ Working Group and the UWA Institute of Advanced Studies are pleased to present a panel offering new research and experiential insights into some of the key issues within the LGBTIQA+ community.

Refreshments will be provided after proceedings, courtesy of the UWA LGBTIQA+ Working Group.

Our Panellists:

Liam Elphick, Lecturer, UWA Law School.
Liam Elphick will look at religious exemptions to LGBTIQA+ anti-discrimination law protections. The right to be treated equally and religious freedom have long clashed in anti-discrimination laws, particularly in regards to the LGBTIQA+ community. This has been borne out by various “gay wedding cake” disputes overseas, where bakery owners have been sued for refusing to bake same-sex wedding cakes on religious grounds. Liam argues that, contrary to public discourse in recent times, religious exemptions in Australia should not be expanded in the event that the marriage equality postal vote returns a “yes” result.

Misty Farquhar, PhD researcher, Curtin University Centre for Human Rights Education.
Misty Farquhar argues that human rights discourse centres around freedom and equality, but these ideas only become truly valuable when paired with social recognition. While there has recently been increased recognition of same-gender attracted people, those who do not fit into a socially normative binary definition of sexuality and/or gender have not reached the same level of recognition. Misty’s presentation will explore what it means to be non-monosexual/non-binary, and proposes strategies to increase social recognition.

Paul J. Maginn, Programme Co-ordinator, Urban and Regional Planning (Masters) at UWA.
Paul Maginn will explore concepts of “cosmo-sexuality” and “sextarianism,” arguing that cities (and regional areas) constitute spaces where diverse sexualities coexist—but not necessarily equally and openly. This inequity and opaqueness are a function of “sextarianism,” that is, the individual and institutional ideas, beliefs, policies and practices that discriminate against, stigmatise and criminalise sexual minority groups and spaces. Paul will highlight the socio-spatial (in)visibility and marginalisation of LGBTIQA+ sex work(ers).

Lena Van Hale, sex worker and peer educator at Magenta, the WA sex worker support service.
Lena Van Hale will explore how, as a trans sex worker and a highly fetishized identity, navigating common misconceptions about sexuality and gender becomes simultaneously a full time job and a major barrier to one. Lena’s presentation uses lived experience to show how systemic discrimination impacts on the lives of sex workers and trans-feminine people, by showcasing mechanisms for navigating stigma and offering strategies for allies.

UWA is the first and only Australian university to achieve elite Platinum Status at the 2017 Australian LGBTI Inclusion and Diversity Awards. The University proudly flies the rainbow flag, supports marriage equality, and sponsors PrideFest.

Wednesday 08

18:00 - PUBLIC LECTURE - How Can an Archaeologist Contribute to Biodiversity Conservation?

A public lecture by Professor R. Lee Lyman, Department of Anthropology, University of Missouri, Columbia and UWA Institute of Advanced Studies Visiting Fellow.

All animals die, and many are eaten by predators. If the predators include humans, owls, or carnivores (e.g., Dingoes), skeletal remains of the prey may be deposited in a shelter used by the predator, such as a cave, and preserved for thousands of years. Such an ‘archive’ is an important source of information on past faunas, typically used to reconstruct past environments or investigate the subsistence practices of prehistoric peoples. But the data provided by palaeozoological remains can be used for so much more.

Palaeozoological data represent the results of long-term biological, ecological and evolutionary processes, including many natural ‘experiments’. Numerous questions of importance to conservation biologists can be answered using palaeozoological data: Is a species exotic/non-native, or is it native to an area? Is a species invasive or is it re-colonizing an area it previously occupied? Is the presence, absence, or abundance of a species the result of anthropogenic, or natural, causes? What might be the effects of translocation/assisted migration efforts focused on supplementing a depleted local population? Is one stock more appropriate than another for providing individuals that are to be reintroduced to a particular area? Will a planned modern development project disrupt a seasonal migration route used by animals for millennia? Palaeozoological data for mammals in western North America exemplify answers to all of these questions, and demonstrate the value to biodiversity conservation of information from archaeological (and palaeontological) investigations.

August 2018

Sunday 12

10:00 - OPEN DAY - UWA Open Day 2018 : An opportunity for future students and the community to explore what's on offer at UWA

Get a taste of uni life as the campus comes alive with interactive activities, entertainment, tours, displays and more.

Visit the Future Students Hub, explore our campus and facilities on a tour, check out the displays and information sessions, enjoy some lunch, chat to representatives from UWA Guild clubs and teaching staff, learn more about our sporting facilities and visit College Row.

Staff and current students will be on hand to answer all your questions about courses and career opportunities. Discover how a degree from UWA will equip you with the skills needed in a rapidly changing world.

We welcome you to write your future at UWA and embrace the opportunities that lie ahead.